Drove down on tuesday in about the most appalling weather I've driven in for a decade. 30mph headwinds and blinding rain. Thank God for Rain-X - we were able to drive for the most part without using the windscreen wipers. I figured we managed only 24mpg on the way down - that's the price you pay for dragging AWD around with you everywhere you go. 60 miles outside Vegas the bloody 'check engine' light came on. Paula did well on the slots this time, me, not so good. Despite being pummelled consistently by the Star Wars slot machine, I kept going back. "Please sir can I have some more?"I got some of it back on Texas Tea though, so it wasn't all bad.

Subtle things have changed making us realise that in small ways, Vegas is getting a lot more expensive. For example, the sliced bananas for my cereal in the morning used to be free - now $2.99. Ordering toast used to result in a rack of toast - now only two slices. The slot machines don't have slots any more - notes only, no change. A lot of the casinos don't have keno any more either. The monorail has gone up from $10 a day to $15 a day. It's little things but they all add up. The Wynn resort was pretty special though with their hidden lagoon. We sat out at the bar having a drink, at the hidden lagoon on the front of the hotel, and couldn't hear any of the noise from the strip. Clever.

The drive back was much better - clear skies and light sidewinds for most of the trip. Managed about 27.5mpg on the way back and learned one thing : you can do at least 500 miles with the 'check engine' light on in our car. I'll be off to Subaru tomorrow to find out what it is - I suspect it's the shite petrol we had to put in on the way down. Frickin' 95 octane crap because they didn't have any 87, 89 or 91. We'll see.

I saw the NAACP "Image" awards advertised on TV this weekend, and I have to ask a politically incorrect question. Or perhaps make a statement. If I'm to believe Image awards, they're basically self-congratulatory awards celebrating blackness at the exclusion of white people. Which is fine - I could care less. But I bet if there was a white-bread Image awards ceremony to celebrate whiteness at the exclusion of blacks, we'd all be branded racist.